I Close My Eyes
by Moth Gypsy
Summary: Sasuke briefly recalls his childhood, and his relationship with Itachi. Can be viewed as ItaSasu or SasuIta.


[I close my eyes

only for a moment, then the moment's gone

-_Dust In The Wind, _Kansas]

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I can't remember what it was like to live in the compound. Not during the winter, fall, or spring. Even now I can observe the snow covered rooftops and see the leaves changing color and watch everything slowly return to life. But I can't apply it to that place, my memories are only of the time before it happened.

Summer, I was eight, Itachi was thirteen. Every night the cicadas created a symphony for me, and the stars outshone the street lamps, and the sky was as diverse in its shades of blue as it were in the day. Even in the evening I could sneak out and the grass would still be warm. If I snuck into the forest or the fields to practice, the warm grass and the singing of the cicadas would hide the noise of his approach- Itachi always seemed to know when I wasn't in bed. He would come find me and, wearily, tell me I shouldn't be out so late. I always knew it was coming, but I relished it. Suddenly I had a chance to be the center of his attention, and if I asked he would always carry me back to the house.

I was selfish then, and I suppose he knew it, but he indulged me anyways. the words he left me with, those words of hate and betrayal, I can't help but think that those are the lies and the truth was every soft smile he reserved for me, and every evening that he carried me, half asleep, into my room. But then there is the compound. The nightmares. I know it was all a lie, but then why do I still try to believe it?

I can remember an evening in particular- it was early July and things in the house were still generally neutral. I had been sent downtown on a mission to buy leeks for supper, and gotten lost. I knew the route by heart, and of course it wasn't all that far, but I wandered off course. Before I knew it the street names were unfamiliar and I hadn't the faintest idea which direction I'd come from. Being an Uchiha I was naturally disinclined to as for directions, and no one seemed to notice me. I wandered for hours until night fell, and at last I came to a hill and sat at the bottom. There were benches and I occupied one of them, hunched in a ball at the far end. Somehow, sitting there, I felt as though maybe everything was okay. If it looked like I was supposed to be there, then maybe no one would notice that I was lost, as much I wanted them to.

It wasn't long after that before he found me, and I remember clinging to his chest and him picking me up so that I could bury my face in his neck. I cried then, and he sat with me on the bench like that for what seemed like hours. When I finally calmed down I asked him if mother and father were angry, and he said no, that they were only very worried. But he and I both knew that they couldn't be too concerned; Itachi loved me, and would never let anything bad happen. And now that I was safe, the whole ordeal seemed dim and meaningless. Funny, even, in how sadly pathetic it all was.

Previously I had been exhausted, but after crying and the excitement of knowing that he had found me, I experienced an energy boost, and was suddenly as awake as ever. He seemed amused by this, and to my surprise, asked what I wanted to do. Like in the middle of the night we could just do anything. But he tempted me, and I figured, why not? So I told him what I really wanted to do.

There was dock system on the outskirts of the village, it bordered a lake which, through a long set of coolies, flowed into the pound outside of the compound. We laid on the docks together, my hand held firmly in his own, and he told me stories about the stars, their names and their struggles.

Looking back on it, I can't remember any of the stories. When he finally carried me home, I was asleep in his arms, but as we entered the house I was awoken by our fathers angry yelling. I don't know if Itachi told him the whole story or not, but either way he was mad. the next morning I explained about how I got lost, and left out the part about the docks. Mother never let me go into town alone again, but then, it wouldn't be long before I was doing everything on my own.

It's funny how in the course of six months I went from that weeping little child who got lost on the way to the market, to an adult, wise in the ways of suffering. I still wonder, if that is how I am, if that is _what_ I am, then whatever was Itachi in comparison? And then father yelling, and mother worrying, and the vendors too busy to notice a lost child- suddenly they all seem like lost children themselves.

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End file.
